Content

Urban ecologies through the lens of creative vegetation use and practice, linked to water sensitive design and urban design, is increasingly becoming a tenet of built environment design internationally. This unit explores urban ecology history, theory and contemporary practice in the design and planning of the built environment, offering insights into new projects, new technologies and approaches that use vegetation to achieve sustainable outcomes at regional, metropolitan, local and specific building levels. This includes a review of urban ecology theory as it relates to urban environments, water systems, urban wildlife systems, coastal and riverine environments, wetland systems, and mono-cultural open spaces as habitat shapers, manipulators and healthy community indicators, and thereupon consideration of urban ecology in design applications including design properties, use in open space and streetscapes, human and wildlife habitat formation and manipulation through a design and planning lens. It also reviews the role and potential of plant materials and plants (trees, shrubs, ground covers, etc) in design and planning applications in mediating environmental effects, heat island mediation, offering environmental psychological benefits and quality environmental outcomes, therapeutic landscapes as place making, and in establishing the identity and distinctiveness of places whether historically or contemporary through a design and planning lens.